JP2003134462A - Image pickup device - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To facilitate the adjustment of a compression rate and the adjustment of focus and diaphragm. SOLUTION: An image pickup part 10 takes an image of an object to generate a photographed image signal and supplies the photographed image signal to a compressing and encoding part 12. The compressing and encoding part 12 performs data compression of the photographed image signal with high efficiency coding processing and supplies the compressed signal to a recording part 14 and a compressing and decoding part 18. The recording part 14 records the compressed signal supplied from the compressing and encoding part 12 on a recording medium such as a magnetic medium. The compressing and decoding part 18 applies inverse transformation processing of the high efficiency coding processing performed by the compressing and encoding part 12 to generate a decoded image signal and outputs the decoded image signal to a displaying part 22. A deterioration detecting part 20 detects deterioration of the decoded image signal on the basis of the photographed image signal from the image pickup part 10 and the decoded image signal from the compressing and decoding part 18. The displaying part 22 overlaps a graphic form corresponding to the detection value of the deterioration detecting part 20 on the image signal supplied from the compressing and decoding part 18 and displays the graphic form as an image.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an image pickup apparatus for recording an image on a recording medium.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, due to advances in digital signal processing technology, a large amount of digital information such as moving images, still images, and audio is highly efficiently encoded to compress the amount of data, and recording and / or communication on a small magnetic medium. It is possible to perform transmission to the medium. By applying such a technique, an imaging device capable of shooting a high-quality image and immediately outputting it to an information medium has been developed.

Some of these devices have a function of changing the compression ratio (compression ratio) according to a user's instruction so that the limited capacity of the information medium can be effectively used. With this function, the user can set a high compression rate to increase the recording time, or conversely decrease the compression rate to prioritize image quality with less deterioration. The user can adjust the preferable compression ratio and shoot while watching the deterioration of the image in the viewfinder.

FIG. 6 shows a schematic block diagram of a conventional image pickup apparatus. 210 is an imaging unit, 212 is a compression encoding unit,
Reference numeral 214 is a recording unit, 216 is an image pickup adjustment operation unit, 218 is a compression decoding unit, 220 is a display unit, and 222 is a compression rate adjustment operation unit.

First, the image pickup section 210 picks up an image of a subject, generates a picked-up video signal, and supplies it to the compression coding section 212.
The compression encoding unit 212 data-compresses the captured video signal by the high efficiency encoding process and supplies the compression signal to the recording unit 214 and the compression decoding unit 218. The recording unit 214 records the supplied compressed signal on a recording medium such as a magnetic medium. The compression / decoding unit 218 performs inverse conversion processing of the high-efficiency encoding processing in the compression / encoding unit 212 on the compressed signal input from the compression / encoding unit 212 to generate a decoded video signal, and the display unit 220 displays it. Apply. As a result, the image of the subject input to the imaging unit 210 is displayed on the liquid crystal panel of the display unit 220.

The photographer operates the image pickup adjustment operation unit 216 (OP_a) to adjust the lens position such as focus while looking at the display of the display unit 220, and further operates the compression adjustment operation unit 222 (OP_b). Thus, the compression rate of the compression encoding unit 212 can be adjusted. Imaging unit 210
Changes the lens position according to the control signal supplied from the imaging adjustment operation unit 216. The compression encoding unit 212
The compression rate is changed according to the control signal supplied from the compression adjustment operation unit 222.

[0007]

In the conventional example, the operation of adjusting the compression rate, which occurs in addition to the operation of the image pickup section, is troublesome, and the user cannot easily learn the operation. In addition, it is difficult to determine whether or not the desired state has been adjusted from the image on the small viewfinder screen, and it is difficult to perform appropriate adjustment.

The present invention has been made in view of the above problems, and an object of the present invention is to provide an image pickup apparatus in which the compression rate can be adjusted by a simple operation that is easy to learn and the degree of adjustment can be easily determined. To aim.

[0009]

An image pickup apparatus according to the present invention includes an image pickup section for picking up an image of a subject and generating a picked-up video signal.
A compression encoding unit that encodes the video signal with high efficiency and converts it into a compression signal, a recording unit that records the compression signal in a recording medium, a compression decoding unit that expands the compression signal into a decoded video signal, and a decoding unit. A deterioration detection unit that detects deterioration of the video signal,
And a display unit for displaying a graphic corresponding to an output value output from the deterioration detection unit.

The image pickup apparatus according to the present invention also includes an image pickup section for picking up an image of a subject and generating a picked-up video signal, a compression coding section for coding the video signal with high efficiency and converting it into a compressed signal, and the compressed signal. And a common adjustment operation unit capable of selectively manually adjusting either the compression rate of the compression encoding unit or the lens position of the imaging unit. .

The image pickup apparatus according to the present invention is also an image pickup section for picking up an image of a subject and generating a picked-up video signal, the image pickup section having two modes of automatic adjustment and manual adjustment of the lens position, and the video signal. A high-efficiency encoding and converting into a compressed signal, the compression encoding section having two modes of automatic compression rate adjustment and manual adjustment, and a recording section for recording the compressed signal on a recording medium. And a switching unit that switches the modes of the compression encoding unit and the imaging unit in conjunction with each other.

The image pickup apparatus according to the present invention is also an image pickup section for picking up an image of a subject and generating a picked-up video signal, the image pickup section having two modes of automatic adjustment and manual adjustment of the lens position, and the video signal. A high-efficiency encoding and converting into a compressed signal, the compression encoding section having two modes of automatic compression rate adjustment and manual adjustment, and a recording section for recording the compressed signal on a recording medium. And a switching unit that switches the modes of the compression unit and the imaging unit in conjunction with each other, and a common adjustment operation unit that can selectively manually adjust either the compression ratio of the compression unit or the lens position of the imaging unit. A compression decoding unit that expands the compressed signal into a decoded video signal, a deterioration detection unit that detects deterioration of the decoded video signal, and a display unit that displays a graphic according to an output value output from the deterioration detection unit. Characterized by having That.

According to the above arrangement, the compression ratio can be easily adjusted by the same simple operation as adjusting the lens position. In addition, an inexpensive device can be configured with a small number of parts by also using the operation part.

Since the degree of deterioration can be clearly known from the above-mentioned figure, the compression rate can be adjusted appropriately.

Switching between manual adjustment for advanced users and automatic adjustment for beginners can be easily performed by linking lens position adjustment and compression ratio adjustment. In addition, an inexpensive device can be configured with a small number of parts by also using the operation part.

[0016]

Embodiments of the present invention will now be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

(First Embodiment) FIG. 1 shows a schematic block diagram of the first embodiment of the present invention. The image pickup apparatus according to the present embodiment can record a moving image obtained by image pickup on a recording medium. 10 is an imaging unit, 12 is a compression encoding unit, 14 is a recording unit, 16 is an adjustment operation unit, 18 is a compression decoding unit, 20 is a deterioration detection unit, 2
2 is a display unit.

The operation of this embodiment will be described. The image capturing unit 10 captures an image of a subject, generates a captured video signal, and supplies the captured video signal to the compression encoding unit 12. The compression encoding unit 12 data-compresses the captured video signal by the high-efficiency encoding process and supplies the compression signal to the recording unit 14 and the compression decoding unit 18. The recording unit 14
The compressed signal supplied from the compression encoding unit 12 is recorded on a recording medium such as a magnetic medium.

The compression / decoding section 18 subjects the compressed signal from the compression / encoding section 12 to inverse conversion processing of the high-efficiency encoding processing in the compression / encoding section 12 to generate a decoded video signal, and the display section. 22 is output. The deterioration detection unit 20 detects deterioration of the decoded video signal from the captured video signal from the imaging unit 10 and the decoded video signal from the compression decoding unit 18. In this embodiment, the deterioration detecting unit 20 calculates the S / N ratio of the decoded video signal to the captured video signal as an index of deterioration. The calculated value is supplied to the display unit 22. The display unit 22 superimposes a graphic corresponding to the detection value of the deterioration detection unit 20 on the video signal supplied from the compression decoding unit 18, and displays it on the liquid crystal panel as an image.

FIG. 2 shows a display example of the display unit 22. Thirty
Is a video display, and 32 and 34 are deterioration index displays. Display 3
2 is a bar graph having a length proportional to the S / N ratio supplied from the deterioration detection unit 20. The length Len of the bar graph is
The less the image quality deteriorates, the longer it becomes. As a simpler display example, in the display 34, the S / N ratio is directly displayed as a numerical value (42d
B) is displayed.

FIG. 3 shows another display example of the display unit 22.
36 is a video display and 38 is a deterioration index display. Display 38
Is a character pattern whose facial expression changes according to the S / N ratio supplied from the deterioration detection unit 20. The less the image quality deteriorates, the more smiley the facial expression of the character becomes, and the more the image quality deteriorates, the more the facial expression changes to a crying face. Furthermore, by changing the color of the character pattern according to the S / N ratio, it is possible to make it easier for the photographer to understand.

The photographer can operate the adjustment operation unit 16 while viewing these displays, and at any time adjust the compression rate to a desired compression ratio before shooting. The adjustment operation unit 16 supplies the compression encoding unit 12 with a compression ratio control signal according to the operation OP1 of the photographer. The compression encoding unit 12 highly efficiently encodes the captured video signal from the imaging unit 10 at a compression rate corresponding to the supplied control signal. For example, the fixed bit rate (CBR) in moving image compression of the MPEG system is 3 Mbps to 4 M
The compression rate is controlled by increasing the bit rate to bps or reducing the average value of the variable bit rate (VBR) from 6 Mbps to 5 Mbps.

FIG. 4 is a perspective view showing an example of the configuration and arrangement of the adjusting operation section 16. The dial 40 is an element of the adjustment operation unit 16. The dial 40 is arranged around the lens and includes a ring that rotates in a plane orthogonal to the optical axis of photographing. By turning the dial 40 to the left or right, the control signal supplied to the compression encoding unit 12 can be changed. For example, a signal for controlling the compression rate by turning it to the right and lowering it by turning it to the left is the compression coding circuit 12.
Applied to. The photographer can instruct to reduce the compression rate by turning the dial 40 to the left by a desired amount when the display 38 has a crying face pattern when photographing a highly important situation. Image quality degradation decreases with the control of compression ratio,
The display 38 changes from a crying face to a smiling face.

By the way, when the dial 40 is rapidly rotated, the compression rate of the image may be rapidly changed, and the image quality may be suddenly changed so as to be visually unpleasant.
As a configuration for coping with such a case, a delay circuit that delays the control according to the operation speed may be added so as to buffer a sudden change.

Further, in this embodiment, the adjusting operation section 16 is
It also serves as an adjustment member for the lens position of the imaging unit 10. Figure 4
In the following, the adjustment operation unit 16 supplies the lens position control signal to the image pickup unit 10 by turning the dial 40 left and right while pressing the button 42. The imaging unit 10 moves the lens to the lens position corresponding to the supplied control signal.
When the dial 40 is turned without pressing the button 42, the adjustment operation unit 16 supplies the compression ratio control signal to the compression encoding unit 12 as described above.

The lens position adjustment is used for focus adjustment and the like. That is, both the compression rate and the focus are finely adjusted for the image quality.
Can be controlled by. This is an intuitive and simple operation for the user, and is easy to learn.

Incidentally, like the dial 44 shown in FIG.
An adjusting operation unit arranged on the back surface of the image pickup apparatus instead of around the lens and rotating in a plane parallel to the optical axis can also be used as an operation member for both image pickup unit adjustment and compression rate adjustment. The adjustment operation unit 16 is not limited to a dial, and can be similarly realized by a jog dial or a seesaw-type operation unit.

(Second Embodiment) FIG. 5 shows a second embodiment of the present invention.
The schematic block diagram of an Example is shown. 110 is an imaging unit,
112 is a compression encoding unit, 114 is a recording unit, 116 is an adjustment operation unit, 118 is a compression decoding unit, 120 is a deterioration detection unit,
122 is a display unit, 124 is an automatic adjustment unit, 126 and 128
Is a switching unit.

The functions of the image pickup unit 110, the compression encoding unit 112, the recording unit 114, the adjusting operation unit 116, the compression decoding unit 118, the deterioration detecting unit 120, and the display unit 122 are respectively:
Imaging unit 10, compression encoding unit 12, recording unit 1 of the first embodiment
4, adjustment operation unit 16, compression / decoding unit 18, deterioration detection unit 2
0 and the function of the display unit 22, the detailed description is omitted, and the operation of the added automatic adjustment unit 124 and the switching units 126 and 128 will be mainly described.

To the automatic adjustment unit 124, a picked-up image signal is input from the image pickup unit 110 and a detection value is input from the deterioration detection unit 120. The automatic adjustment unit 124 automatically generates a lens position control signal and a compression ratio control signal according to these input signals and supplies them to the switching units 126 and 128, respectively.
These automatic adjustments are realized by known feedback control.

The switching unit 502 selects either one from the lens position control signals supplied from the adjustment operation unit 116 and the automatic adjustment unit 124 according to the operation OP2 by the photographer and supplies it to the image pickup unit 110. Similarly, the switching unit 12
8 selects one of the compression ratio control signals supplied from the adjustment operation unit 116 and the automatic adjustment unit 124 in accordance with the photographer's operation OP2, and supplies it to the compression encoding unit 112.
Both the switching units 126 and 128 are interlocked and switched by the operation OP2.

The photographer can collectively switch between full-automatic shooting by leaving the control of focus and compression rate to the automatic adjusting section 124 and manual shooting while manually making fine adjustments by the operation OP2. it can. Similarly, the aperture control of the image capturing unit 110 can be collectively switched.

(Other Embodiments) The present invention may be applied to a system including a plurality of devices (for example, a host computer, an interface device, a camera, etc.) or an apparatus including one device. .

An object of the present invention is to supply a storage medium (or recording medium) recording a program code of software for realizing the functions of the above-described embodiments to a system or apparatus, and to supply a computer (or computer) of the system or apparatus. C
It is needless to say that it is also achieved by the PU or MPU) reading and executing the program code stored in the storage medium. In this case, the program code itself read from the storage medium realizes the function of the above-described embodiment, and the storage medium storing the program code constitutes the present invention.

By executing the program code read by the computer, not only the functions of the above-described embodiments are realized, but also an operating system (OS) running on the computer based on the instructions of the program code. Performing a part or all of the actual processing and realizing the functions of the above-described embodiments by the processing are also included in the technical scope of the present invention.

Further, after the program code read from the storage medium is written in the memory provided in the function expansion card inserted into the computer or the function expansion unit connected to the computer, based on the instruction of the program code. , The CPU provided in the function expansion card or the function expansion unit performs some or all of the actual processing,
The case where the functions of the above-described embodiments are realized by the processing is also included in the technical scope of the present invention.

[0037]

As can be easily understood from the above description, according to the present invention, it is possible to realize an image pickup apparatus in which the compression rate can be adjusted by a simple operation and the degree of the adjustment can be easily determined. it can.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a schematic block diagram of a first embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an example of a display screen of the first embodiment.

FIG. 3 is another display screen example of the first embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a configuration and arrangement example of an adjustment operation unit 16.

FIG. 5 is a schematic block diagram of a second embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 is a schematic block diagram of a conventional example.

[Explanation of symbols]

10: Imaging unit 12: compression encoding unit 14: Recording section 16: Adjustment operation unit 18: Compression decoding section 20: Deterioration detector 22: Display 30: Video display 32, 34: Deterioration index display 36: Video display 38: Degradation index display 40: Dial 42: Button 44: Dial 110: Imaging unit 112: compression encoding unit 114: recording unit 116: Adjustment operation unit 118: compression decoding unit 120: Deterioration detector 122: Display 124: Automatic adjustment unit 126, 128: Switching unit 210: Imaging unit 212: Compression encoding unit 214: Recording unit 216: Imaging adjustment operation unit 218: Compression decoding unit 220: Display 222: Compressibility adjusting operation unit

Claims (17)

[Claims] 1. An image pickup section for picking up an image of a subject and generating a picked-up video signal, a compression coding section for high-efficiency coding the video signal and converting it into a compressed signal, and a recording section for recording the compressed signal on a recording medium. A compression decoding unit that expands the compressed signal into a decoded video signal, a deterioration detection unit that detects deterioration of the decoded video signal, and a display unit that displays a graphic according to the output value output by the deterioration detection unit. An image pickup apparatus comprising: 2. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the deterioration detecting unit calculates an S / N ratio of the decoded video signal with respect to a captured video signal. 3. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the graphic is a bar graph that expands and contracts according to the degree of deterioration of the decoded video signal. 4. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the figure is a character image whose expression changes according to the degree of deterioration of the decoded video signal. 5. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the figure is a character pattern showing a numerical value that increases or decreases according to the degree of deterioration of the decoded video signal. 6. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the color of the graphic changes according to the degree of deterioration of the decoded video signal. 7. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the display unit displays the graphic in superimposition on a video signal. 8. An image pickup unit for picking up an image of a subject and generating a picked-up video signal, a compression coding unit for high-efficiency coding the video signal and converting it into a compressed signal, and a recording for recording the compressed signal on a recording medium. An image pickup apparatus comprising: a unit; and a common adjustment operation unit capable of selectively manually adjusting either the compression rate of the compression encoding unit or the lens position of the image pickup unit. 9. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 8, wherein the focus is adjusted by adjusting the lens position. 10. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 8, wherein the adjustment operation section is composed of a dial member that rotates in a plane orthogonal to an image pickup optical axis of the image pickup section. 11. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 10, wherein the dial member is arranged around a lens of the image pickup section. 12. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 8, wherein the adjustment operation section is composed of a dial member that rotates in a plane parallel to the image pickup optical axis of the image pickup section. 13. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 8, wherein the compression rate is a fixed bit rate (CBR) of a compressed signal. 14. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 8, wherein the compression rate is a variable bit rate (VBR) of a compressed signal. 15. An image pickup unit for picking up an image of a subject and generating a picked-up video signal, the image pickup unit having two modes of automatic adjustment and manual adjustment of a lens position, and the video signal is highly efficiently encoded and compressed. It is a compression encoding unit for converting into a signal, and there are two types of compression rate automatic adjustment and manual adjustment.
Imaging comprising a compression encoding unit having a mode, a recording unit that records the compressed signal in a recording medium, and a switching unit that switches the modes of the compression encoding unit and the imaging unit in conjunction with each other. apparatus. 16. The image pickup section has two modes of automatic adjustment and manual adjustment of the diaphragm, and is switched in association with the adjustment of the compression rate and the lens position by the switching section. The device according to. 17. An image pickup unit for picking up an image of a subject and generating a picked-up video signal, the image pickup unit having two modes of automatic adjustment and manual adjustment of a lens position, and the video signal is highly efficiently encoded and compressed. It is a compression encoding unit for converting into a signal, and there are two types of compression rate automatic adjustment and manual adjustment.
A compression encoding unit having a mode, a recording unit that records the compressed signal on a recording medium, a switching unit that switches the modes of the compression unit and the imaging unit in conjunction, and a compression ratio of the compression unit or the imaging A common adjustment operation unit that can selectively manually adjust either one of the lens positions of the sections, a compression decoding unit that expands the compressed signal into a decoded video signal, and a deterioration detection unit that detects deterioration of the decoded video signal. An image pickup apparatus comprising: a display unit that displays a graphic corresponding to an output value output from the deterioration detection unit.